


The Great Explorers (or The Time Selphie and Irvine Had To Break In The New Guy)

by eerian_sadow



Series: Final Fantasy Exchange pieces [2]
Category: Final Fantasy VIII
Genre: Final Fantasy Exchange, Gen, Post-Canon, Post-Game, doink 2014, final fantasy exchange 2014
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-19
Updated: 2014-05-19
Packaged: 2018-01-25 19:22:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,551
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1659623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eerian_sadow/pseuds/eerian_sadow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Selphie heads up a poorly matched team in order to give the Centra Ruins a good exploring.  Again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Great Explorers (or The Time Selphie and Irvine Had To Break In The New Guy)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [eternalbreath](https://archiveofourown.org/users/eternalbreath/gifts).



> This piece is set roughly 10 years post game, though that bit never actually shows up in the text. More headcanon for this 'verse exists, so there could be companion shorts in the future.

"But Squall, we already explored the Centra Ruins!" Selphie didn't stomp her foot in irritation, but the desire to do so was very present. "What else can possibly be out there?"

"I don't know," the Garden commander said calmly, "But Matron says that odd things have been happening out there for a while and that some of the White SeeDs went to check it out and never came back. If she's worried, I'm worried."

The small woman sighed and crossed her arms. She still didn't want to go back to the ruins--they were creepy!--but if Matron was worried, then it was probably something big after all. "Fine, but I get to pick the team."

"I already know you'll take Irvine." Squall slid a folder across the desk to her. "So I just took the liberty of filling in the third member for you."

"You take all the fun out of things." Selphie took the folder and opened it. She frowned when she saw her team. "Rider Hardhand? That's kid from Winhill who barely scored well enough to make it into SeeD. You have _got_ to be kidding me."

"He has to get experience sometime, Selphie."

"Yeah, but the Centra Ruins is not the place for it! He'll get eaten alive out there. Possibly literally."

The taller man smirked. "You and Irvine can handle it. I have faith in you."

"I kind of hate you right now, Squall."

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Irvine crossed his arms and glared at the door to the garage. "Now, I know I'm not the most punctual SeeD to graduate from any Garden, but this new kid makes me look like Quistis."

"Tell me about it." Selphie leaned back against the car they would be driving out to the landing strip where they kept the _Ragnarok_. "If he's not here in two more minutes, I'm going to his quarters and dragging him. I don't care if he has to come on this mission _naked_."

"I care," the sharpshooter said solemnly. "At least let him put on a pair of boxers, so I don't have to spend the whole trip trying not to see his privates."

She stared at him for a moment, trying to decide how serious he was being.

"That's a punishment I don't deserve, darlin'," he added, grinning slightly. 

She returned the grin, letting him lighten her grumpy mood. "Funny, I thought you liked other men's privates."

"Only in places where I can lock the door," Irvine replied without missing a beat.

They both chuckled and Selphie felt some of her tension ease. The new kid still only had a minute and a half to make it to the car before she went and dragged him out of his bed, but with her best friend on the same mission, she would be able to handle it.

"So I hear Ma Dincht is firing up the grill for lunch and I have it on good authority she's got enough dogs for a few hungry SeeDs. Want to stop for a decent meal before we spend the next two weeks eating my cooking?"

"No way. I'm not rewarding Hardhand's tardiness with Ma Dincht's cooking. Besides, I'd rather have her food after the mission, to make me forget how bad yours is."

Irvine smiled and tipped his hat. "Anything you say, captain."

Ten seconds later--leaving himself thirty seconds on Selphie's internal clock--the third member of their team slid into to garage, still buckling his belt. "Sorry I'm late, Captain Tilmett. My roommate thought it would be funny to turn off my alarm clock."

Selphie sighed and wished all the Garden graduates from this class worked as well together as Squall and Zell's class still did. None of them would _dream_ of turning off their roommate's alarm the night before a mission. "You're forgiven, this time. Next time set a backup. Now get your gear stowed and get in the car."

"Um..." Rider sounded confused. "Gear?"

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

The first day, they found the bodies of three of Matron's White SeeDs. Soberly, they wrapped them in the bodybags kept in the _Ragnarok_ 's medical bay and stored them in the freezer dedicated to that purpose. Then they sent a message to Balamb Garden, so that Squall could tell Edea what had happened to her students.

They would give them a proper funeral once they wrapped up the mission.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

"I don't get why we have to hang around here and eat Irvine's crappy cooking and sleep in a tent. We should just fly to the closest town and stay at the hotel." Rider made a face as he swallowed a spoonful of the soup the sniper had made. 

"You have the gil to pay for a nice hotel, kid?" Irvine asked, keeping his tone as non-confrontational as possible. He freely admitted that his cooking was awful--thought it was better than Selphie's--but he didn't know anyone who'd been permanently injured from sleeping on the ground for a couple of weeks. "Or for the fuel cells for the _Ragnarok_? Cause Esthar ain't giving those away."

"You mean Garden doesn't pay for that stuff?"

"Not unless the mission requires it. And since we're nowhere near civilization right now, it's not a requirement." The older man shrugged one shoulder and spooned soup into a bowl for himself. Selphie could serve herself when she got back from checking their perimiter for beasties. "You'll get used to it, kid."

"Yeah, well, I didn't realize I was signing up to eat bad food and sleep in the dirt when I joined SeeD."

Irvine thought about some of the places he and the Orphanage Gang had slept during the Second Sorceress War. "Trust me, kid, it's better than some of the alternatives."

"Whatever."

The sniper frowned at the dismissive tone. "Finish your soup and get to sleep. You've got second watch."

Broken sleep was a bitch, and it might just put the kid in his place. Maybe.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

"Sephie, come look at this." Irvine waved their team captain over to a pile of rubble that looked a like it might have been a control console before the ceiling caved in on it.

"Looks like some of the tech in Esthar," the smaller woman said, crouching down next to him. "Wonder what it operated."

"I dunno," the sharpshooter replied. "But it looks like there's some cables back here. Maybe we should follow them and see where they lead."

"Sounds good." Selphie stood back up and turned toward the third member of their team. "Rider I want... What? Is there a frog on my head or something?"

"N-not you, captain. Over there." The young SeeD pointed just past the ruined console, an area she and Irvine had ignored in favor of the damaged piece of technology.

The team captain followed the line of his finger and frowned at the monster that was slowly approaching them. "Oh for the love of Shiva. It's just a Tonberry."

The senior SeeDs pulled out their weapons as the Rider sputtered. "W-what do you mean "just" a Tonberry? Have you read the file on those? Have you ever even seen one before?!"

"Really?" The older woman asked as Irvine fired on the monster. "You're freaking out because you read some of Quistis' monster files? Did you even _have_ a field test?"

"There weren't any monsters!" Rider protested.

"Great Hyne," she muttered. Then she sprang forward to attack the Tonberry.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

" _How_ did you manage to break your leg so badly that magic won't heal it?" Irvine asked as he carried Rider piggyback down the rickety stairs of the ruins.

"I don't know," the younger man replied with a pained whine. "But I'd really like to just go home now."

"Yeah, that's not happening," Selphie said from behind them. "You just get to sit on the ship until we're done."

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

 _"Okay,"_ Rider said through the ear piece Selphie was wearing, _"I have you both on my radar screen. No monsters in your vicinity, but there's a bunch of them starting to cluster at the base of the stairs. Better be careful."_

"We're always careful," Selphie replied, looking at Irvine and grinning impishly. "Keep an eye on them and let us know if any of them start heading up."

_"You got it, Captain."_

"You think he's going to be okay in there?" Irvine asked.

The small woman muted her end of the communication channel. "He sounds a lot calmer already. I think he just needs a position out of the field. Squall was crazy to send him out here with us."

"Crazy maybe, but the kid does have good eyes. I kind of liked having him watching my back."

"And he still is. He's just safely away from the beasties." Selphie moved back into the room they had been investigating when Rider broke his leg. "Come on. I think we can get the door hotwired and see what's on the other side. Maybe it'll be something actually useful for a change."

"Hey, that Regen draw was useful," the sniper replied. "And those phoenix pinions."

"That was one room out of ten." She picked her way across the broken floor. "Not a good success rate, which is what I told Squall was going to happen. There's nothing left here but monsters."

"If you say so, Sephie. But I have this feeling we're going to run into something crazy."

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Rider used the ship's stores to make their meals while the senior SeeDs explored. The food still wasn't good--most of it was just rehydrated pouch rations--but it was better than Irvine's cooking. The kid might have been hobbled by the splint they'd put on his leg, but he was making himself useful to the mission still.

Selphie felt some of her irritation with him dissipate.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

"Okay, Rider, we're heading in." Selphie put her hand on the (somehow) still-working door panel.

_"Confirmed. Be careful in there, captain. The readings on my screen are all over the place."_

"We'll be ready for anything." The captain gestured for Irvine to draw his rifle while she prepared a Firaga spell. "Let us know if anything is sneaking up behind us."

"Ready when you are, Sephie," the sharpshooter said, pointing his weapon at the door.

"Opening the door now." She pressed the correct button on the control panel. There was a long moment's delay, then the door began retracting into the wall with a painful screech.

Nothing rushed out to attack them, but there was a single decaying Tonberry corpse crumpled near the door. Selphie almost felt sorry for the monster; trapped alone in a locked room was no way to die even for one of them.

"Poor thing," Irvine murmured. "Wonder how long it's been in there."

"Definitely before the first time we were here, cause we didn't explore this far in," the team captain replied. "The next room looks clear. We're heading in."

 _"Confirmed. There was a definite energy surge when you opened the door, so be ready for anything."_ Rider's voice was steady, but he sounded concerned.

"I'll head in first," Selphie said. "That way Irvine can shoot over my head if necessary."

"You're not that short," the sharpshooter said, keeping his focus on the doorway as she stepped through.

"I so am," she replied. "It's clear. Nothing hostile in here but the dead Tonberry and a lot of little locking drawers."

"Drawers?" Irvine's curiosity was peaked. "Who builds a room full of drawers?"

"The Centra, apparently. Let's see if any of them open."

_"Work fast, Captain. There's a large group of monsters heading your way."_

"How large?" Selphie and Irvine moved to opposite ends of the room and started tugging on drawer pulls.

_"At least twenty, maybe more. They're clustered pretty tightly, so I'm not sure."_

"Even at twenty, they can still only come through that door one or two at a time." The sniper worked his way across the room, trying the drawers set into the wall that were too high for Selphie to reach. "We can handle it."

"Yeah, we've got this." The small woman grinned as one of the drawers slid out into her hand. Her eyes went wide as she peered inside. "Irvy, look. This is the same kind of case we store GFs in at Garden."

He moved to her side. "Is there anything in it?"

"Yeah, but I don't know who. Or what. It's not labeled."

_"Captain, you've got about ten seconds before the monsters are in the room with you._

"Okay." Selphie set the drawer down on the floor and drew her nunchaku. She was turning back to the door as the first of the Tonberries--clearly being affected by a haste spell or three--rushed through.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

"You're back sooner than I expected." Squall looked Selphie's battered team over with a critical eye. "What happened."

"Oh, you know," Selphie replied brightly, "Bunch of Tonberries, broken limbs, found a bunch of hidden GFs. The usual stuff."

The Commander's eyebrow raised. "Define 'a bunch' of GFs."

"We found ten that were viable," Rider replied. "And also collected one during combat."

Squall blinked. "Eleven?"

"Eleven," Irvine confirmed. "And some destroyed cases, so we think another dozen or so probably escaped when the ruins were destroyed. We think they energy they were giving off was attracting the monsters that kept giving Matron and her people trouble."

"Good job, you three."

"Thanks, Squall." Selphie beamed. "Now, Rider needs a trip to medical, Irvine needs a shower and I need to speak with you in private."

The Garden Commander nodded. "Dismissed then, you two. But I want written reports on my desk by 1500 tomorrow."

"Yes, sir," Irvine grinned and saluted sloppily. Then he looped Rider's arm over his shoulder and supported the younger man so they could limp to medical.

Once the elevator doors had closed behind the departing SeeDs, Squall focused on Selphie. "So, what is it?"

"It's Rider, actually." She sighed and flopped into a chair, uncaring of the dirt and grime she was smearing all over his nice furniture. "He's not meant for the field, Squall. I'm not sure he would have made it back if he hadn't broken his leg when he did."

"What do you mean?"

"He's useless in combat, won't sleep on the ground and it didn't even occur to him to pack gear for this trip. I know he was trained, but it clearly didn't take." She shrugged one shoulder. "He's not stupid, he's just... not cut out to be a soldier. He was great as a comm tech and scanner tech when we left him on the ship, though. If you keep sending him out into the field, you're wasting his talents."

"That's your professional opinion?"

"Yep."

"And your personal opinion?"

"Squall, if you send him out into the field with me again, I will feed him to a Tonberry myself."

"And now I remember why you don't help Quistis with the field assessments." The dark haired man gave her a small smile. "Get those GFs into storage so we can evaluate them and then get some rest. I'll turn Rider Hardhand into Xu's problem in the morning."

"Thanks." The small woman returned his smile. "My next mission better be someplace really swanky after all this."

"Deling City, at least," Squall agreed.


End file.
